New Year’s Resolutions: Meaningful or Pointless?
New Years is a time for hope, excitement, change, reflection, and of course resolutions. Maybe we want to lose weight, eat healthier, exercise, quit smoking, be more honest, patient, or kind, find success in our careers and so on. It is easy to get wrapped up in the excitement of what change could look like without a clear plan of how to get there. 80% of these resolutions fail because even though we think we want change, we might not be ready to take the action needed.
Are resolutions pointless? Why do we continue to make bold claims of change only to end up failing to follow through or forgetting what we said by early February? It is in our nature to be growing, learning, and evolving, but we are also creatures of habit. While we may want to make positive changes in our lives, change is both scary and hard.
In order to create real change, we need self-reflection, a clear objective, and an action plan with accountability. Let’s say your New Year’s resolution is to exercise more. Think about why that is important to you and reflect on your exercise habits for the previous year. We thrive on routines and when we make a change to our daily patterns, it can be hard to make it stick. Think about what was comfortable about your routine from the previous year and then see if you can add a specific goal to include exercise. For example, you are going to follow a YouTube Yoga video for 30 minutes when you wake up on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. If you create a specific goal and think about how it fits into your life, you can slowly start to rewire your brain to form a new habit which includes your New Year’s Resolution. Once you know why it is important and have a goal, tell others about your plans to create accountability. Have your friends and family check in with you about your goals and schedule a monthly check in with yourself to see how you are doing.
If you want to work on something more abstract, such as being kinder, more honest, or more confident for example, you can follow the same model. Make sure to evaluate why this is important, be specific on the actions you will take to accomplish your goals, and create an accountability plan.
Another strategy is to write down your resolution and put it up somewhere in your home as a visual reminder. That way, there is no hiding from your goals. It is, however, OK to ask for help from your family and friends to accomplish your goals and hold you accountable too.
My resolution for 2021 is to be kinder to myself by appreciating my faults, identifying my strengths, and focusing on gratitude. When I reflected on the past year, I realized that I felt most grounded, happy, and connected to myself when I expressed gratitude for things that I had in my life. At the beginning of the pandemic, I made it a practice to say three things that I was grateful for out loud to my husband each morning. This felt empowering, helped me put things in perspective, and brought me peace. As the days went on, I forgot about this practice because it was not yet part of my routine.
For 2021, I made the decision to buy a gratitude journal and keep it on my nightstand. My goal is to take 2 minutes everyday to check in with myself and reflect on my gratitude. Some days I will jot a few words down, and others I may draw a picture or just read a daily gratitude quote. I set a reminder on my calendar for one month from today to see how I am doing with my goal and to see how it has affected my outlook on my life.
I think that New Year’s resolutions can be meaningful if we take the time to carefully think about what we want to change, make specific goals, and come up with a plan. What happens if I check in with myself in one month and find that I haven’t kept up with the journal? Will my resolution be pointless? No, because I still reflected on my year and tried to do something different. Change is hard and takes time. Hopefully, I will keep my own resolution by being kind to myself and forgiving myself for not following through on my goals. If you don’t find success with your 2021 resolutions, take a moment to reflect on what went wrong and forgive yourself. There is always next year or better yet, next month to make a change.